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All of the latest Mists of Pandaria newsPoaching for skins
by Mike Schramm 
Dec 4th 2008 at 5:00PM
I have to thank you, other players on my realm. If it wasn't for you, I probably wouldn't have reached 450 Skinning already. Yes, the garbage of dead mobs that you leave behind becomes my profit -- when you leave that worg corpse or the dead drakonid behind, I'm all too happy to run over, skin it, and clean up that little mess you've made, while sticking a little gold in my pocket as well. Matthew is right there with me -- he calls it poaching, though we're both referring not to stealing, but to simply skinning the leftover mobs of all those players before us.Truth be told, I probably poached more than ever down in the mines of Netherwing Ledge -- there were always players killing down there, and what they didn't skin, I did, both for the quest skins and for my own Knothide. But in the expansion, things are even better -- everywhere I go, there are fields of leftover mobs, and even when someone is able to kill a mob before I get there, I hover over them to pick up the skin afterwards.
Matthew has put together a list of all the great places to pick up extra skins -- I'll agree that Coldarra is full of poaching options right now, as is Kamagua on the other side of the continent. Grizzly Hills, also, is not only full of creatures to skin, but lots of leftover corpses as people quest across the zone (though odds are that if you keep up on skinning, you'll be 450 by then anyway). Think of it as a service -- we're the garbagemen of the realms, cleaning up your kills so the next can spawn and the circle of loot can go on.
Filed under: Skinning, Items, Analysis / Opinion, Tips, Leveling, Making money, Wrath of the Lich King
Reader Comments (Page 3 of 4)
Truffled Dec 5th 2008 3:01AM
@Matthew
"Skinning is a tough profession"
Sorry... this made me laugh, really. Skinning is the easiest proffesion, other than the secondaries. I'm not knocking your guide. It's great to know where to go to get skins, but your comment. Not true, not even a little.
Pigwar Dec 4th 2008 6:37PM
I swear I am the only skinner on my server sometimes. I ran around the island the Nexus is on ghost wolf-y and got to 450 before I hit 72. I also am just now catching up to my level in LW due to how much leather I get. Plus I am making a good chunk of gold selling the leg armor upgrades.
Finally it feels good to be a skinner. Never really liked it in BC.
Jason P Dec 4th 2008 6:35PM
I poach all the time. At least half of the leather/scales/scraps/whatever I get is from other people's kills.
If I come across someone killing, I will wait to see if he/she will skin. If I dont see it, I will ask if he/she minds if I do.
On the flip side, all these elementals that require herbalism/mining, since I dont have those skills, I leave them for others.
Heck, sometimes I am so busy killing a mob of skinnables, that I forget to go back and skin. LOL
skreed Dec 4th 2008 6:36PM
... you said 'for skins.' heheheheh...
Armath Dec 4th 2008 6:59PM
I love being able to skin somebody else's kill (or mine/herb in the case of certain elementals), but sometimes it feels like we skinners are the trash collectors of WoW, cruising the highways and byways taking care of the road kill left by other players.
Not that I'm complaining. I've just started level 71 and am at 445 skinning without trying hard.
Haarits Dec 4th 2008 7:13PM
Oh, I loved skinning in BC. Nagrand was my home whenever I wasn't questing or running an instance or using the AH. Thick Clefthoof stacks were going for anywhere from 60-120g, often at the high end toward Wrath's release date (people leveling alts & using LW to gear 'em up a bit, I imagine), and Heavy Knothide stacks were going for roughly the same. That said, in Wrath it's been a blast, and I haven't even hit most of the post-BT/HF skinapaloozas yet! That first weekend I skinned up probably 8-10 Arctic Furs just off low-level mobs and (foolishly?) sold them on the AH for a nice profit, which helped ease the major dent in my bank after training all my professions.
For skinning, others' leftovers are our nodes & herbs. We can either gather by killing stuff ourselves, or take the leftovers from others that have no need for 'em. Sometimes we have to fight to get some, like miners clearing mobs around a nice blue Cobalt node; other times, there's nobody around and we can gather it all freely.
If I'm killing a pile of mobs for the skins, I just loot & skin each in turn. Prevents others from 'poaching' from your stash, though there are the annoying glitches that happen when you've got multiple corpses stacked up... even if you right-click with a skinning icon visible, you might end up looting another corpse first, then have to click again. It's pretty effective at keeping all my kills to myself for skinning.
Vocenoctum Dec 4th 2008 8:16PM
I hit 450 pretty quick, if not totally from the little whelps in Ember Clutch. It was so busy that first or second day, I was there for an hour or two to get my kills, and I swear no one skinned the entire night...
Hiruma Dec 4th 2008 8:22PM
remember, unlooted skinables makes the Baby Thrall cry
Kal Dec 4th 2008 8:33PM
I have complete skinning fever. It's gross. I automatically right-click on everything I have killed and looted, and then realise that it's, like, a humanoid and feel a bit dirty. That said, the opportunity to make Supple Nelfskin Gloves and the like wouldn't go amiss.
I will always skin corpses that lie around (you need a LOT of leather to get leatherworking up) and will help someone kill if I'm then going to skin their corpses. I helped a gnome mage kill worgs the other day, then picked up all her skins, then a /hug and a /bye (all you can do cross-faction) and I was done.
Turlagh Dec 4th 2008 9:40PM
Poaching is such a distasteful term. I prefer to call it Sanitary Engineering. I made a big dent in my DK's skinning with all the left over Helboars in Hellfire.
Dave Dec 5th 2008 1:17AM
Honestly this was the MAIN reason that I decided to level my Hunter first. I knew that the prime time for poaching skins was NOW, wheras digging up herbs and ore would have high competition, so I knew without a doubt that my Druid and Warrior would have trouble getting the resources needed to level their skills, while my Skinner would see piles and piles of quickly respawning corpses just lying around for me to take advantage of.
Like most people, I hit 450 skinning before I was out of the Tundra and that was the first zone I bothered with. (never got any free icy dragonscales from Coldarra though, I must be cursed). I cruised through the Nessingwary quest zone just for kicks and left with 160 leather after half an hour of skinning everyone else's mobs. Then i did the questlines myself and ended up with another 200 leather through my own kills and everyone else's. It's nuts. it's huge amount of bonus leather left and right and only skinners can even take advantage. It'll never be this good again until the next expansion unless they put in a new daily quest zone with Nessingwary-like beast or dragon slaughtering happening on an epic scale.
I kinda figure this sort of thing has about a month left in the top tier zones where a lot of people are. After that, I think even most of the casual players will be at 80 and there won't be nearly as much ready to go corpses lying around for easy skins.
Azizrael Dec 5th 2008 2:18AM
Hit 450 by 71.5, picking up about 6 Arctic Fur on the way. I'm a Tailor, so all the leather goes on the AH - currently selling fast on my server for around 20g a stack of basic borean, and about 30 for an arctic fur.
Snuzzle Dec 5th 2008 5:45AM
I just can't stand when people don't even ask or wait and just start skinning a mob I've only just looted. Um, hi, I can skin that, and I was gonna.
I see it as the same as ninja'ing a node out from someone who is fighting the "guard" mob. It's just crappy. Ask me, and I will be glad to let you skin the mobs I cannot. But if you start taking them without asking, I -will- leave loot on the mobs so you can't skin them. Usually these people get bored with that pretty quickly, after which I can loot/skin the mobs I left behind :D
Ohnoto Dec 5th 2008 7:13AM
There is a quest in Dragonblight, cant remember the name, but you have to kill the snake looking guys up in the north area for a drop.
You can also skin them and get the drop also, I followed a few mobs behind this guy and skinned the ones he killed and finished that quest without ever having to kill a mob.
And I got a few scales along the way. :)
feldling Dec 5th 2008 7:55AM
I dinged 450 skinning before I had even left Howling Fjord because I was so busy skinning leftovers. It made me a ton of money, especially with the initial inflated prices on skins. Thanks everyone!
Axolotl Dec 5th 2008 8:48AM
My Deathknight is about halfway through Terokar (Jame's guide) and has 415 skinning, went over 375 in Hellfire Peninsula skinning mobs from other Deathknights (and mobs it killed) before it reached level 62.
I wait for people to leave their killings before I go to skin, and they don't have to worry if an ad commes in to disrupt them from skinning.
I've seen players that don't loot their corpses completely, and that can be unwise if you're on a PVP-server (corpsetrail always leads to someone ... it won't always be a friendly that follows the trail)
(BTW. go to Howling Fjord to learn it from 350 up, in Borean Tundra the trainer is too difficult to reach in one go, in Howling Fjord, it's not that far from the zeppelin)
Evi Dec 5th 2008 9:10AM
I love skinning other people's leftovers. I hit 450 skill before reaching level 71.
However, I never "hover" over other players. I always watch carefully to make sure they aren't a skinner before swooping in. It's annoying when someone runs over and tries to skin my kill practically before the corpse has even hit the ground. So I don't do that to other people.
Anrie Dec 5th 2008 11:20AM
I love you all skinner. I am a cooka dn always fel so bad when i leave tons of dead mobs in my path getting meat. I alway try to find a skinner and see if they would like to help out and skin them little dead ones . and it does realy help the spawn rate, Iv timed it .
aris Dec 5th 2008 10:31AM
Poaching infers theft, taking something not yours. Skinning right after another player loots to prevent them from skinning it is poaching.
Scavenging is the term for skinning discarded mobs.
windex Dec 5th 2008 10:28AM
"Skinning is, in my opinion, the hardest gathering profession in the game."
This article lost me after the first sentence. I've been a skinner since day one, and it is by far the easiest gathering profession in the game. Especially in Lich King. There are hot spots all over the place (consider zones 75+ to avoid scraps), there are VERY few skinners to compete with nowadays, and many instances are packed with skinnable mobs.
I have been skinning on average a full stack of heavy leathers (6 stacks of normal) every day just from running a couple heroics and 15-20 minutes in one of my farming spots. 270g easily for that stack on my server. Not to mention the occasional arctic fur drop (expect one per 50-80 regular skins)